Christmas vacation - Day 9

I awoke Sunday morning at 6:30 AM. At first, I thought I was dreaming about the 4th of July, because I could hear the occasional "pop" of the fireworks and see the flashes on my walls. Suddenly, it occurred to me I was really hearing and seeing it!

Mystified, I got out of bed and walked around the house. A very strong, stiff wind had developed overnight. When I looked out the living room window, I saw flashes and sparks and heard loud pops coming from two wires across the street. The wind was making them bounce and touch and when they did, BAM!

Just then a Redford fire truck pulled in. The crew got out with strong flashlights and investigated. I can only assume they called the Edison Company. Other than waving flashlights around and jumping when the sparks flew, that's all they did. Then they drove away.

When daylight came, I warmed a cup of coffee in the microwave and sat on the couch, watching the show. Every time the wind would gust, the two wires would touch, spark and make a loud crackling noise, and my house lights flickered.

One of my neighbors from down the street walked by, talking into a cell phone and watching the light show. He noticed me on the couch and waved.

Finally, around 8:00 AM, Lu and Sadie got up. Sadie said she, too, had seen the flashes through the blinds, but thought it was lightning.

They were eating breakfast and I was working on my Blog entry. I was about halfway through when the power went out. No power means I had no lights, no furnace, no phone and no Internet. I figured since it was just my street, (I could see lights everywhere else but on San Jose), help would arrive soon. What I didn't know was this was much more widespread than I thought and some 250,000 other people in Michigan were also without power.

My neighbor, the builder, had gotten out his big generator and it was hammering away. I wished I had one! Then, Lu was looking out the kitchen window and noticed his "Tiki Hut" had collapsed in the wind and the roof was on the ground

Around 11:00 AM, with that fierce wind, the temperature in the house was dropping rapidly. I figured that the most important thing was to protect my water lines from freezing, so I headed out to Home Depot to buy some sort of supplemental heater.

They didn't have any of the kerosene types I was familiar with, but they did have a 30,000 to 70,000 BTU per hour propane-powered one. I was concerned because there was a warning on the box that read, "Not for living spaces," so I hunted down the manager. He said it meant you shouldn't put it in one room and close the door. However, if you were putting it in, say a basement and letting it heat the whole house, it would be fine.

Then, after parting with $100 US, I headed for Murray's to get some propane. According to the carton said one tank would last 11 hours, so I bought two tanks. Since I didn't have exchange tanks, I had to pay $125 US for them!

Back home, I carefully read the instructions and got the heater fired up. Even on the medium setting the temperature rose quickly to 75 degrees F. So, I played with it a while until I was maintaining 70 degrees F. in the house. Just to be on the safe side, I opened the downstairs bathroom and my bedroom windows a crack.

Lu and Sadie left around 1:00 PM to go to Lu's mother's Christmas celebration. Since I had a really rotten night's sleep, I decided that reading in bed would be a good idea and finally fell into a fitful sleep.

Lu and Sadie got back around 6:00 PM. Since they had eaten at her Mom's (and I was sick as a dog) nobody was in the mood for dinner. Sadie had some fruit and nuts and Lu a bowl of popcorn with thyme in it (we were lighting the gas stove with a grille lighter).

Speaking of which, as both Sadie and Lu pointed out, when their electricity goes out, the consequences are much more severe then mine. I still could use the stove, I still had running water and, as I discovered somewhat belatedly, the gas hot water heater still worked. So, it was bad, but not as bad as it could have been.

Lu left for Target to buy some additional flashlights. She came back and said that the power outage was more widespread than I thought. Everyone was talking about it at the store and they had an entire section set up with batteries, lights, heaters, etc. So, she bought two big 9-volt flashlights and a Coleman battery-powered camping lantern (as well as a LOT of D-batteries).

We got the flashlights and lantern working and stayed up for a little while. They were beat though, and went to bed early. I read in my room with the lantern for a little while (I didn't want to run the batteries down) and then went to bed, the drone of the neighbor's generator lulling me to sleep.